WA
176 posts
I took the plunge and bought one of these Ekiy tablets via the official Ekiy store on AliExpress. It cost a total of AU$140 incl. postage. The shipping was amazingly efficient - I ordered on 30th March and the package was delivered at 9pm 6th April (Easter Monday).
I haven't installed on the boat yet, but have been running it off the car battery and can confirm that it all works as expected: WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS. The screen is bright enough to see in filtered daylight, but might struggle in full sunlight on the boat. It can handle running Navionics whilst playing Spotify via bluetooth, so should come in quite handy.
On the downside: if you're used to using a modern phone you might find this tablet a bit slow. Not awful, but expect a lag after tapping on a button. It is installed with Android 13, which is a few years old and is no longer supported by Google. It's still the 3rd most common Android OS so should be OK for a couple of years, but eventually I'd expect apps will no longer run on this version.
More updates once I get a chance to take it sailing.
WA
176 posts
What's your budget? If you're looking at a Redwitch I'm guessing its on the sub-10k side? Otherwise there's a nice looking Flinders 7.8 for sale on Facebook for $35k
The Redwitch has the advantage of being able to sail under the bridges at Freo without dropping the mast, but it is a fixed keel boat - so not the easiest to launch and trailer. And then you won't be able to pull up on the beach at Rotto when you get there. You'll have to anchor off or pay for a mooring.
Have a look at a Court 650 - another West Aussie boat. Friends of mine have had these and cruised to Rotto several times. One guy even did it so much that he cut the mast down so that it was the same height as a Witches and was able to sail under the bridges. He was effectively sailing with a reef in his mainsail the whole time - but not too much of an issue in the sea breeze off Freo.
